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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27849502">Five Ways Zlatan Ibrahimović Knew Paolo Maldini</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guede/pseuds/Guede'>Guede</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Men's Football RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>A.C. Milan, Alternate Universe, Blow Jobs, Clubbing, Dubious Consent, Flirting, M/M, Medical Professionals, One Night Stands, Retirement, Team Dynamics, Wall Sex</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-12-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-12-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 22:06:52</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,443</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27849502</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guede/pseuds/Guede</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>You don’t need Il Derby Della Madonnina for explosions.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Zlatan Ibrahimović/Paolo Maldini</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Five Ways Zlatan Ibrahimović Knew Paolo Maldini</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Originally written and posted to LiveJournal in 2008.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was dark and cramped and more humid than the wet cotton-candy air outside with all the gasps and laughs of the people in the club crowding into the small space between their heads and the ceiling.  Your clothes stuck to you the moment you walked in, and at first you felt annoyed because your shirt had cost more than your first bike or you’d just gotten a shave and a haircut at the finest barber’s salon in Milan.  But then it didn’t matter, because it was so hot and damp that everyone was slicked down with sweat, silk and linen and cotton clinging everywhere, and soon it was obvious that it wasn’t about the clothes, anyway.  Clothes were like skin, just there, and under the thumping bass they seemed to dissolve, leaving nothing but a tangle of twisting, writhing flesh.  It was suffocating and joyful in there, and the press of it clutched at the throat for hours afterward.</p>
<p> “Hey,” Paolo mouthed, finally pushing his way through.  “Sorry.  Traffic—”</p>
<p>The outgoing DJ shook his head, then smiled, teeth like a strobe flash through the smoky air.  He pushed the headset off and jammed it down on Paolo’s head, his mouth moving open and shut, the lips curling and rolling and peeling back as he said something.  Neither of them could hear the other, with the din around them, but it was good manners to act like they did.  One of them had to leave, after all, and come to their senses outside in the sopping air, throat raw with someone else’s cigarette, wrung out and facing the blistering dawn.</p>
<p>But one was coming in, and the other man gave Paolo a clap on the shoulder in half-envy for that as he squeezed himself out the door.  The room was so small that Paolo had to lean into the edge of the counter, feeling the chipped wood sink its splinters through his slacks.  He tugged and twisted at the headset, his fingers slipping on the worn damp leather of the earphones till he got them right way round.  Then he could hear something, very dimly, a whisper over the senseless, patternless waves of noise coming off the dancefloor.  He sat down, and spread his fingers over the dials for the mixers, digging them into the plastic so he could hear the vibrations of the music better.  The last song was coming to the end and he had a split second to pick the next one, to make sure that it would ride lightly on the mood below and keep that crowd churning and twisting without beating down all those upraised arms.</p>
<p>He liked the job.  It wasn’t a job anyway, not in his head and certainly not in his bank account, and so he could just lean back and enjoy it all the time.  Perhaps he’d go half-deaf in his old age from the music, like his father sometimes grumbled, but he’d stood in other places and heard that buzzing whine that preceded a great roaring.  He was young but he’d already heard the thunder rolling down the stands of the San Siro to crash onto the pitch, with its promise of violence still lurking behind the clockwork beauty of the game, and he had to admit he didn’t always like that as much.  The demand in it, the pressure that crushed instead of enveloped—out there your clothes didn’t evaporate in the heat.  No, very much the opposite, with how they could grow heavier and hotter, till they felt like a brand scorching every side of you.</p>
<p> Paolo twitched, startled by a slice of burn across the back of his neck.  He turned around and one of the waitresses smiled at him, handed him a drink from the bar.  The icy sides of the glass burned again against his fingers and he put it down quickly, flicking the condensation from his fingers.  She smiled again, and he laughed and nodded but leaned away when she dragged her fingers through his hair on her way out.  He wasn’t so young that he thought he could be foolish; he enjoyed the ebb and crest of the music, but he didn’t think that that made him a playboy.  He liked sitting up in the booth, his fingers slowly melting into extensions of the soundboard as he cupped one earphone to his ear.  Nothing more than that.</p>
<p>He did take a sip about two songs down, for it was as hot in the tiny room as it was in the club below, and for all its humidity, the air seemed to strip the moisture from him as easily as Franco could take a ball from an opposition player.  The drink had alcohol in it, a lot, and Paolo grimaced absently as he put it down.  Eventually the overlapping susurrations—some catchy chorus he half-recognized—smoothed it out into a warm glow all about the inside of his mouth, and he took another sip after he switched albums.</p>
<p>The occasional dancer broke free to stumble breathlessly up to the wall beneath him, glitter above her eyes or a long stream of sweat pouring from his temple.  They’d make a request, more with the gesture of a hand or the curve of a smile than with any real conversation, and he’d fill it for them.  And then they’d be off again.  Sometimes one stayed because they knew him, or because they knew of him, and wanted to talk—but that was somewhere else, really, and it was too hard to fight against the insistent, always increasing push of the music.  Sooner or later it would draw them back into the ocean of dancers, like the curl of the tide.</p>
<p>Paolo half-felt the knock when it came time for his break, like a misstep.  He reached back and grasped for the knob, telling the crowd below to enjoy themselves, to put down their drink for a slow one and he’d be right back, and then he finally turned to put his fingers on the handle.  He pulled the door open without looking, already twisted around again, making a few little adjustments to the volume before he left.</p>
<p>Someone put their hand on his wrist as he stood up, then dropped it, leaving the tug between them.  He turned and the man in the doorway towered over him, wild brown waves raked back from the angular planes of his face.  The man’s mouth seemed to stretch across his face and was so animated that it seemed to have a life of its own.  For the first few moments Paolo wasn’t even trying to figure out what the man was saying, but was only staring at the sheer mobility of the lips, the way they shaped into circles and pointed ellipses.</p>
<p>“What?” he said, shaking himself.  He came out into the hall, idly kicking back as the door followed him to clip one heel.  “What?”</p>
<p>The man tried again.  It was much darker in the hallway, harder to make out the man’s features, but oddly, it was easier that way to actually see him.  The blur of the shadows dampened the man so he came out from behind his mouth, like lowering the tenor to bring out the bass.  His teeth showed, large and square and white, and his shoulders seemed to swoop out to touch the sides of the narrow corridor.</p>
<p>Paolo put up his hand, and the other man stepped forward so Paolo’s palm pressed into his chest.  Sweat squeezed from the man’s shirt up between Paolo’s fingers and he slid his hand up to the shoulder as the man bent down towards him.  It was still impossible to make out what he was saying, but now Paolo could hear the man’s voice, rough and low with a foreign gravel to it.  He dug his nails into the man’s shoulder, asking ‘what’ again, and the man fell silent.</p>
<p>Then he laughed at Paolo.  The laugh bashed through the noise around them and brashly soared above it, the clearest thing Paolo had heard since he’d walked in.  It made Paolo wince, and grip harder at the man’s shoulder as it twisted away from him.  He pulled it back and took the man by the other arm as well, not understanding, and the man pushed him up against the wall.  He was laughing again, saying something between the laughs in a tone that teased down the coil of Paolo’s ear, and then his tongue followed the same path as Paolo arched in surprise. Hot and quick and then gone, and Paolo was still falling back on his feet from it when the man pinned his hips to the wall.</p>
<p>Left him on his tiptoes.  The air between them flashed hot, then burned like the vaporizing of alcohol off the skin as the man dropped to his knees.  Paolo’s hands dragged off his shoulders and tangled into his hair.  Something scraped over the seam of Paolo’s crotch, and then clicked as his fly peeled open.  He twisted sharply, and then again at the first shock of the man’s mouth, half-falling over the man’s head.  He had to wrap his arm around it for support before the man shoved him back, sucked him in and that twist of the man’s tongue against the underside of his prick seemed to flay him open.</p>
<p>His head thumped back against the wall.  He stared up at the ceiling and it bounced wildly towards him before abruptly drawing back, up and away so far and so fast that he didn’t even try for a handhold.  The air went still and flat, then surged up in all directions as a guitar riff drowned out Paolo’s harsh gasps.  There was a moment of dissonance before it was all subsumed, and the heat and pressure and noise was so great that he couldn’t make them out and so it was like being in the club, so sweaty that you didn’t feel it anymore.  Like being underwater, so surrounded that you didn’t feel the lack of air.</p>
<p>Till you burst through the surface, and the air rushed down your throat and burned it so badly you almost wanted to go under the water again, away from that merciless scorching.  Paolo tried to stop his gasping even as his dizziness made him stumble, made his fingers slip as he tried to pull together his fly.  A warm, wet tongue slipped into his mouth, momentarily stopping his breath, and he moaned in relief.</p>
<p>Then it was gone.  The man told him something, head cocked to the side, half-smiling because the shadows cut off the other half.  He touched Paolo’s shoulder, familiarly, and Paolo must have nodded or made some signal because the man looked satisfied.  His hand flicked over Paolo’s head as he sauntered away, the press of its palm urging Paolo to slip down again.</p>
<p>Paolo finished his shift still dazed, the music intermittently brushing over him.  He left his drink untouched when he changed over for the next, and then walked outside.  It was cooler now on the street than in the club, and the coolness seemed like a slap in the face.  He blinked hard, wondering at the straightness of the road, the solid geometry of the buildings, the absolute space in the air around him.  It was a different world.  Properly ordered, comprehensible, steady.  Even the pressures in it were predictable, coming every weekend or sometimes in the middle of the week, but at any rate, one always could see what was coming.  There was no need to ride on it, towards it, because it would come to you.</p>
<p>Boring, he would’ve said earlier.  He stood there a while, leaning against a brick wall, feeling the sweat dry on his skin and make his clothes stiff and itchy.</p>
<p>In the morning he came to practice even though there wasn’t practice.  Mister Sacchi was sitting in the bleachers when Paolo looked up, like he’d dropped out of the morning mists.  He smiled and waved Paolo over.</p>
<p>“I’m going to be a defender,” Paolo told him.  “I’m going to defend this club.”</p>
<p>And Mister Sacchi smiled as if he’d expected nothing less.  He said that Paolo had made a good start, and that he would have to continue, and he spoke crisply and clearly.  You could hear out here, even in the San Siro with the stands full of screaming tifosi.  You could hear very well, because the roaring would recede into the boundless sky above and leave you alone, and it was very easy that way.  It was not always pleasant, but it was easy.</p>
<p>Once his teammates wanted to take Paolo back.  He stood at the door, making his excuses, and the man pushed by them.  Paolo followed the man with his eyes—simple with the way he stood a full head above nearly everyone—till the man disappeared into a backdoor.  A moment later he reappeared in the DJ booth.  The music changed, throwing out a slinky snaking invitation of a voice, and Paolo had to twist away.  He needed to breathe.</p>
<p>*	*	*</p>
<p>“He’s such a drama queen,” Zlatan snorts, rolling along the hall.  He’s showered like the rest of them, but somehow he still carries the smell of the pitch with him.  Earthy and pungent, a bull amid all the delicate china fragrances of everyone else’s designer cologne.  “Adi didn’t even <i>touch</i> him.”</p>
<p>“It was an awkward landing and he’s just come back from injury, and so I can understand how Sandro reacted,” Paolo calmly replies.  He’s actually texting Sandro at this moment, asking how the man is.  Something bumps against his back, but he doesn’t look up.</p>
<p>Zlatan leans further over Paolo’s shoulder, then snickers.  His breath ruffles Paolo’s hair.  “Making nice for internationals?”</p>
<p>“I’m retired from those.  Of course that doesn’t mean I don’t keep in touch with old friends.”  Paolo snaps shut his phone and looks up in time to avoid walking down the hall into the home team’s area.  Then he pulls Zlatan aside.  “We’ve gotten turned around somewhere, haven’t we?”</p>
<p>“Yeah, well, captain, I figured you of all people would know where you were going in here.”  After a moment, Zlatan twists about to slouch against the doorway.  He picks at a nail, pretending to be interested in something going on down the hall.  “Hey, if you want to talk to your <i>old friends</i>, you could’ve just told me to get lost, tag along with Del Piero or something.”</p>
<p>That’s black and red down there, not just black or black and white, and for a moment Paolo’s chest hurts.  Then he breathes, and takes Zlatan by the arm again, and pulls them away.  He’s learned a long time before that it doesn’t do any good to pick at a sore, and that some sores are never as healed as they look.  “No, I just got lost myself, apparently.  Come on, the bus should be this way.”</p>
<p>“You sure?  Because I think I see Inzaghi, and that’s…” Zlatan squints, walking backwards because he’s too large for Paolo to make turn “…hey, that’s Nesta—”</p>
<p>“Come.  Now.”  Paolo grimaces at his tone, and at the way his grip has gone to iron on Zlatan’s arm.  But he continues along, forcing himself to go at an easy pace to not attract attention.</p>
<p>After a while Zlatan turns around.  He shakes Paolo off him—he has such strength in him that sometimes a small part of Paolo feels like the bullwhip being shaken at the snarling lion—and snorts, shoulders and hips shifting in jerky irritation.</p>
<p>“Sorry,” he eventually says.  It’s not an apology.</p>
<p>“I like to talk to them later, the next day.  Not right after,” Paolo explains.  He pauses to try and smooth out his voice.  “You have to leave things on the pitch.  It’s respectful to them, and to you.”</p>
<p>“Well, you were texting him.”  Though Zlatan’s shrugging now, mussing with his hair, his stance relaxing.  He’s not hard to talk to or to encourage, for all his brashness.  He does listen, and tends to take the side of reason more than his age would really predict.  “I kind of thought—”</p>
<p>“It’s all right.  I understand.”  Paolo adjusts the strap of his bag where it’s cutting into his neck.  “I shouldn’t have gotten us lost.</p>
<p>Zlatan laughs, putting his hands behind his head and making wings of his elbows.  “Hey, you’re the captain.  I think you get to get lost once in a while.  It’s not like you’re not still captain.”</p>
<p>“I appreciate that,” Paolo says, looking up suddenly.</p>
<p>He stares too long, probably.  Or maybe Zlatan, clever as he is, sees something, for the other man looks at Paolo again.  Then Zlatan starts to ask a question, but he stops himself and uneasily moves his shoulders.</p>
<p>“I appreciate that you respect me that much.  If respect is to be earned, then it shouldn’t be taken for granted once one has it.  Nor should it just be something…that exists on the pitch, or because someone told you,” Paolo adds more slowly.  He looks down the hall and finally spots the rest of their group, and quickens his pace.  “I hope you never let anyone tell you differently.”</p>
<p>“I don’t think you need to worry about that.”  Zlatan moves his mobile features in a half-grimace.  “Though it makes me fucking wish I had you for internat—hey, my seat!  Get your ass out of there!”</p>
<p>Zlatan runs ahead to claim his place on the bus, but Paolo lags behind.  He’s half-watching the other man, half-watching the walls around him that are so familiar—that he’s been pretending not to see all this time, and that had been why they’d gotten lost.</p>
<p>Then he looks at Zlatan again, and he—he shakes his head, and hopes at least his words stay with the man.  Because he knows by now that little else will, once the man finds out what’s going on.  But Paolo can’t stay—things have progressed too far, and anyway he cannot sleep at night now and he is not the type who can live like that.  He has to move.  Again.  And like the last time, he’ll have broken promises to those who relied on him, and will be leaving them to make their own way without the help he promised them when they came.  He’ll try and keep in contact, keep something, but the mended thing is never the same as the unbroken one.</p>
<p>He got lost somewhere, a long time ago, and he’s never made his way back.  He keeps trying, but he still hasn’t stumbled back onto the right way.  But he cannot walk the wrong for long, and so he keeps searching blindly, looking for what he used to have.  Even though, deep down, he knows that it’s pointless because he didn’t lose it so much as <i>break</i> it, and so…he steps on the bus, and smiles at them because he does care.  But while he might be their captain, this is not his place.</p>
<p>*	*	*</p>
<p>They had Paolo come for the club presentation.  Not for the photoshoot with the kit, or the meet-and-greet with the fans, though he did stop over with the club reporter to give the usual statement.  No, he came to the end, and then nodded in a friendly greeting as the door opened.</p>
<p>Zlatan started like a cornered animal, then peeled back his lips.  He was trying to smile, or give that impression.  “Maldini.”</p>
<p>“Zlatan,” Paolo said smoothly, putting out his hand.  “Welcome to—”</p>
<p>“Look, I’m fine with Nesta, I just liked teasing him because he gets so…so <i>flappy</i>.”  The other man’s hands twitched like he wanted to demonstrate, but one was bundled about his presentation jersey and the other was stuffed into his jeans pocket.  He was surprisingly lean—somehow he’d looked bulkier on the pitch.  Standing in front of Paolo now, in street clothes, he would’ve made Adriana tsk over whoever was cooking for him.  “It was just a match thing.  I have no problem with him outside of—”</p>
<p>“If that was the issue, then he would be here.  I just wanted to come and introduce myself, since we’ll be on the same team now.”  Too late, Paolo thought the better of that last part.  But it had come out casually enough, and so he attempted to smile it away.  “We’re all excited to have you here.”</p>
<p>Zlatan cocked his head.  Then he looked over his shoulder, hearing something.  He half-turned to shut the door and his mouth started to twitch.  “Good God, do I have to do this too?”</p>
<p>“Pardon?”</p>
<p>“This whole smarmy I’m-so-nice thing that they lick up like it’s chocolate,” Zlatan said, nodding towards the press-room.  He shook his head, then swung around Paolo and began to walk away.  “I’m a football <i>player</i>.  I’m not the spokesman.  I mean, you pay people to do that, don’t you?”</p>
<p>Paolo turned with the other man and came along while he thought.  He rubbed at his cheek, then his temple.  “We are pleased to have you here.  <i>I’m</i> pleased to have you here.”  He looked at Zlatan.  “That means Inter can’t have you.”</p>
<p>The other man stopped in the middle of his sneer.  His eyes narrowed, and then he laughed.  “Okay, this is a lot better.  Look, Maldini, I did sign the contract and everything, and I’m gonna honor it.  And I’m going to kick ass for your club, and I’ll be nice to Nesta, even.  But I’m going to do it being Zlatan Ibrahimović, all right?  You signed Zlatan, you get Zlatan.  It’s just as straightforward as that.”</p>
<p>“I understand,” Paolo said.  He waited till they’d turned the corner and were in a quieter hall.  “I would rather speak plainly as well, and have everything clear so there are less misunderstandings.  So this <i>thing</i> that you and Sandro have…”</p>
<p>“We’re not fucking.”  Zlatan strode easily along, his head bobbing slightly short of the ceiling.  “And I don’t want to fuck him either.  I don’t know what he wants—he comes off kind of funny sometimes—but I’m really just in it to annoy him.  He’s got great reactions, but if he’s like that all the time—”</p>
<p>“He can be,” Paolo said under his breath.  If they were going to be honest.</p>
<p>“—then hell, no.  I mean, can you imagine it?  Whine, whine, whine, till you just want to stuff a pillow over his face,” Zlatan finished.  Then he looked at Paolo, half-expectant and half-wary.  He seemed oddly nervous behind his sarcasm; his fingers kept fidgeting up and down his strap.  “Not to mention he’s all bony.  I like to be able to hold onto something, you know?”</p>
<p>  Paolo nodded tactfully.  He wasn’t going to respond to that last part, but he was rather relieved to hear the rest and thought he should acknowledge that.  As happy as he was that the club had gotten a proven striker, with a personality that could take the huge pressures Milan brought, he had been dreading the prospect of Zlatan and Sandro thrown together for long periods of time.</p>
<p>“Anyway, if I was going for somebody here, it’d be you.”  Then Zlatan looked away, flushing a little.  He worked his chin up and down, screwing up his face as if he wished he hadn’t said that.  And he had spoken very quietly and in a rush.  “I mean, I like poise and beauty, and Nesta is all—”</p>
<p>“You never even showed a bit of interest before,” Paolo said thoughtfully.  “Not even much interest in challenging me.”</p>
<p>Zlatan wrinkled his nose.  “Hey, excuse me, I did run you around.  It just was easier to make Nesta get mad, and…and why do you care?”</p>
<p>“Sandro wouldn’t be interested in you, so you don’t need to be concerned about him.  Well, his temper, but that’s all,” Paolo replied after a moment.  He shrugged, then let himself sigh.  It’d been a long time and he’d grown accustomed to it, but now and then he did find himself feeling a bit wistful.  He put it down to age.  “Believe me.  I’ve known him for a long time.”</p>
<p>“And I guess Kaká’s too preachy?  You know, if you’re going to worry about me getting into it with anyone, you should worry about him.”  The brow Zlatan raised was provoking, but he was still hanging back, oddly stiff.  Come to think of it, he’d tended to be rather distant whenever he and Paolo had interacted before, but he had never seemed terribly respectful.  “Well, that’s good.  I don’t need more Italians jumping on me.”</p>
<p>“Oh?  But I thought you were saying you’d…I suppose jump is the slang now, isn’t it?”  Paolo edged a little nearer and looked directly up at Zlatan, who flushed again and took an awkward sideways step.  So he was right, and it could all be put down to a shyness that didn’t seem too strange, now that Paolo thought about it.  Time and again, he’d seen young arrogance wilt before the prospect of something they really cared about.</p>
<p>Zlatan made an odd shimmy to keep moving while he was half-twisted around.  “Maldini?”</p>
<p>“Paolo,” Paolo said.  “Has anyone shown you around yet?  I know you’ve seen the lockers and pitch, but the cafeteria?  The massage tables?  What about the sauna?”</p>
<p>“Holy shit,” Zlatan mumbled.  He bounced on the balls of his feet, his eyes fixed on his toes.  “Um.  No?”</p>
<p>“Well, we can go now.”  Paolo took Zlatan’s arm, gently resting his fingers on the stiff muscles, and pointed them down a different hall.  “I hope you like it here.  I think you will, but if you have any problem, please feel free to come see me and I’ll see what I can do.  I want you to be happy.”</p>
<p>A little bit of Zlatan’s confidence resurfaced, and he shot Paolo a knowing sidelong look.  “That’s generous of you, isn’t it?  You do this for everybody?”</p>
<p>It was good that he still could assert himself, but Paolo wished—he pushed that away.  He tried not to dwell; there was too much fodder for that by this point of his life.  “No, actually.  Not for a while.  But you’re not the usual signing, are you?”</p>
<p>“Nope,” Zlatan said.  He wasn’t grinning, but he was looking too closely at Paolo, thinking too hard.  Listening too closely.</p>
<p>But he didn’t speak, and he resumed his nervousness when Paolo happened to brush his hip while pulling out a door for him.  Which was a relief of a different kind, Paolo thought.  He was old enough for wistfulness, but he hadn’t yet outgrown regret.  The best he could do was make it stay behind him, and look towards the future.</p>
<p>*	*	*</p>
<p>“Who are you?” Sandro asked sharply, stopping in the doorway.</p>
<p>Paolo had to hop a little to avoid treading on the back of Sandro’s foot.  He stepped back, then looked up just as the man in the room looked back at them.  The stranger had on a club suit, but the jacket was half-off and the tie was pulled out halfway so its knot swung somewhere about the fourth or fifth shirt-button.  Then the man straightened up and pulled the jacket completely off, and his shirt was properly tucked in but he was so tall that that made the cloth stretch taut against him, showing that he took care of himself as well as any of them.</p>
<p>“I’m the new doctor.  Who the hell are you?” the man said.  He dropped his jacket on a nearby coat and came forward while Sandro was still drawing breath to take offense.  “You think medicine gives a shit about how famous you are?  You want that thigh of yours working again, then you show up on time for your appointment, Mister Alessandro Nesta.”</p>
<p>Sandro shut his mouth hard.  His head twitched back, the way it always did when he was reassessing something.  “Carletto wanted me in for the team talk.  It’s on the—”</p>
<p>“I have a copy of your schedule engraved on my heart,” the man drawled.  Of course he wasn’t Italian, with that beaky crag of a nose and wide mouth, but he spoke it well enough.  His accent was noticeable but not a disadvantage.  “Sit down.  And if Ancelotti wants to run over time, then tell him to come have it out with me.”</p>
<p>After another moment, Sandro swung his bag off his shoulder and let its momentum carry it onto a chair.  He walked in with a backwards brow-arch at Paolo, then took a seat on the nearest examination table.  “Really, isn’t it a Milan virtue to be classy in everything that we do?”</p>
<p>“San—” Paolo started.</p>
<p>“Yeah, which is why I’m wearing this dumb suit even though the collar’s going to collapse my carotid.  But you also buy the best, and I’m the best damn doctor sports medicine has seen in a decade.  Maybe in a century in a few years.”  The doctor was grinning now, even as he went briskly about his business with pushing Sandro back on the table and stretching out his leg, doing the preliminary examination before the scan.  He at least acted like his profession in that, even if his attitude continued to be…interesting.  “Besides, there’s nothing classy about surgery.”</p>
<p>Sandro went stiff and silent for several minutes.  He fidgeted with his sleeves once the doctor had gone over to Paolo, and didn’t look up till they had moved to the scanning room.  “Are you saying…”</p>
<p>“Not if you do what I tell you.  I’m not a big fan of doing operations on every single little thing like everyone else is these days—trauma from surgery’s worse than the injury a lot of the time, I think.  But you should be fine.  If you listen to me.”  The doctor gestured for Sandro to get out of the way, then went back to the console as Paolo took Sandro’s place.  “So stop being late.”</p>
<p>“I told—why aren’t you being mean to him?  He was late, too,” Sandro sputtered, pointing at Paolo.  Then he caught himself and looked half-regretfully at Paolo.</p>
<p>Of course Sandro wasn’t really that sorry, but he simply didn’t want to upset Paolo.  At this point that wasn’t necessary because Paolo was used to the other man, but Paolo shook his head to make the other man stop worrying.</p>
<p>“He’s got nicer legs,” the doctor said.  He glanced up over the monitor long enough to wink at Paolo, then went studiously back to work as Sandro blinked hard.  “Well, Mister Maldini, you seem to be going according to schedule.”</p>
<p>“That’s not fair,” Sandro protested.</p>
<p>Paolo looked curiously at Sandro, who grimaced and plopped himself down so that the machines blocked him from view.  After a moment, Paolo shook his head and pushed himself up on his arms to see what he could of the monitor.  He started to ask about the Juventus game in three weeks, but was cut off by a horrible screeching as the doctor tried to twist the monitor towards him.</p>
<p>“Jesus, that needs some oil.”  One eye squinted and the other wide open, the doctor jiggled the monitor a little.  Then his eyes went to the same size as he ducked down and fiddled with the base.  “A bit old, huh.”</p>
<p>“Paolo, I’m going outside.  I’ve got to call Gabriella,” Sandro abruptly said.  He pushed himself out of his chair and walked around the scanner, tossing the doctor a baleful look as he went.</p>
<p>He still was moving a bit stiffly, Paolo noted.  And whether that was due to his thigh or to his…Paolo sighed before he could stop himself.  He’d long since learned how to deal with the disappointment and pain of injuries, and the frustration of the convalescence period, but it seemed like Sandro never would.  Every new setback struck him as hard as the previous ones, and sometimes Paolo really wanted to tell him not to take it so deeply, because that was their life.  Sometimes things didn’t go their way, and one couldn’t change that so one had to move on.</p>
<p>Of course, he already knew what Sandro would say to that, and how the man would slam the door.  Physical injuries weren’t the only kind of hurt that still nagged at Sandro.</p>
<p>“You know you’re thirty-nine, right?”  The doctor had managed to twist the monitor around, but now he was leaning on the little table that held the keyboard so his head and shoulders were blocking the screen.  “Even I can only do so much.”</p>
<p>“I do know, thank you, and I appreciate the work of the medical staff,” Paolo said after a moment, gathering his composure.  “It’s all I can ask of you.”</p>
<p>Half of the doctor’s mouth quirked.  He shook his head.  “You know, the fat load of money this club tossed at me doesn’t make things look any better.  At least with him, if I poke something, I get a reaction.  With you, I might as well have gone to engineering school instead, with what’s going to be making you up soon enough.  You really think another year’s worth having plastic and metal joints for the rest of your life?”</p>
<p>“Yes,” Paolo said sharply.  Then he slid back on his elbows a little.  He pursed his lips a few times.  “You don’t talk like—”</p>
<p>“Yeah.  So I don’t know any more than he does why you all hired me.  I didn’t act any different in the interview, so I guess I must just be that good.”  The doctor grinned again, but there was an edge to it.  And it didn’t last long either, fading even as he pushed himself back in his seat.  “You look all right for what you’ve done, Mister Maldini.  But honestly?  You don’t have the knees for what you want to do.”</p>
<p>Paolo pressed his lips together, and didn’t breathe for a moment.  He slowly laid back down, brushing his hand over his chest to smooth his shirt.  Then he pushed his fingers into his side and that pressure made him inhale, and he began to remember that he had had a good, fruitful career at the best club in the world, and had a loving family with two beautiful sons by his beautiful wife, and many wonderful friends.  And with all of that he still wasn’t satisfied.</p>
<p>He looked off to the side.  There was only blank wall before him, but beyond that he could picture Sandro sprawled out in the chair, one hand in his hair, chatting away on the phone.  Then Paolo looked back at the doctor, with the lanky red-and-black tie about his neck.  “I appreciate your honesty.  I mean that sincerely.  And I understand what you’re telling me—I understand that I don’t have what I need, and that I’ll never have it at this point.  But honestly…I don’t think I care.”</p>
<p>The doctor looked at him, then pulled back his lips in a smile.  The curve of his mouth was sarcastic, but oddly enough, his eyes were almost sad.  “Fair enough.  Not that that’ll change anything, but they don’t pay me to make you people sane.  All right, then, I’ll see you in a week.”</p>
<p>“I’m looking forward to it,” Paolo said.  He sat up and offered his hand, and after a wary moment, the other man took it.  He had a good handshake, as arrogant and firm and careful as he was.  “Dr. Ibrahimović.  It’s good to have you at Milan.”</p>
<p>Zlatan stopped with his hand half-withdrawn.  Then he shook his head, chuckling.  “You know, I’m going to hate you even more than him at this rate,” he replied, jerking his head at the other room.  “Well, get off my table, captain.  You’ll be back on it soon enough.”</p>
<p>Paolo couldn’t disagree.</p>
<p>*	*	*</p>
<p>“I thought about sending them to the club, but then I thought about all the press that it’d stir up, and all the crap people would give me, and I wouldn’t even know if you got them.  So here.”  And Zlatan handed Paolo a bouquet of flowers.</p>
<p>He must have just arrived in Milan, fresh off the plane.  Not that Paolo had a reason to keep track of such things now, but he knew Inter hadn’t yet started their training camp.  “Thank you,” Paolo said, and took the bouquet.  “But what are they for?”</p>
<p>Zlatan made a face at him.  “That’s why I bought a <i>card</i>.  You didn’t retire a day too soon, huh.”</p>
<p>Making an ‘ah’ expression, Paolo nodded apologetically and looked into the bouquet.  He twisted it around, then had to duck aside as a particularly tall spray tickled his nose.  After his sneeze, he gave up and invited the other man in while he got a vase for them.</p>
<p>They were very beautiful and fresh, and once he’d stuck them in the vase and the vase on the floor, he was able to push aside their abundance to pick out the card.  He read it while Zlatan wandered around behind him, looking at the pictures on the wall.</p>
<p>“Thank you,” Paolo said when he’d finished.</p>
<p>“Whatever,” Zlatan said, and stepped forward and grabbed Paolo by the back of the neck.  He crushed the card between them and bruised Paolo’s lips rather badly, then came away laughing.  He pulled at his clothes as Paolo stumbled back against a table, caught a chair-back and righted himself.  “The flowers were just to get inside, actually.  Like they’d fucking make you happy about retiring.”</p>
<p>Paolo started to kick at him, only to jerk back his foot as it came dangerously near the vase.  He gasped for breath.</p>
<p>“I came over because I figured you’d miss all the bitching and fucking with each other’s minds, and hey, I can do that much.”  Zlatan laughed again, but not so mocking.  “Least I could do.  It’s gonna be so irritating, just picking on Nesta now.”</p>
<p>“Then don’t.”  It came out as a rasp, since Paolo hadn’t quite caught his breath.  He did manage to pull himself up on the chair, and then he looked at Zlatan.  “Thank you.  But don’t you bother—”</p>
<p>“C’mere and make me,” Zlatan taunted.</p>
<p>Paolo broke the vase.  Fortunately, it wasn’t an expensive one, and no else was home so he didn’t have to worry about shutting the doors as he and Zlatan rolled through them.  He didn’t have the time to do it either—well, he did have the time now.  He had the time, and he had the option to spend it not being responsible, and he preferred taking that option, for once.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>1.	As a child, Paolo was a Juventus fan.  Later, he grew up to DJ in his spare time around being a prodigiously talented young footballer.<br/>2.	After becoming coach of Milan in 1987, Arrigo Sacchi found Paolo vacationing in Sardinia and asked him point-blank if he wanted to be a footballer or a playboy.  Neither man has ever finished the anecdote, but presumably Paolo answered with the former.<br/>3.	Zlatan almost went to Milan in 2006, but Inter beat Milan to his signature.<br/>4.	Zlatan once <a href="http://dryada.livejournal.com/930.html#cutid1">compared</a> Freddie Ljungberg (his national team captain at the time) to Alessandro Del Piero (his club captain at the time):  “In Juventus we’ve got Alessandro del Piero, and he’s boss.  Everything’s run through him.  If you want something you take it to the captain, and even if he’s on the bench he’s still captain.”<br/>5.	While Zlatan was at Juventus, Adrian Mutu (also playing for Juventus) and Alessandro Nesta collided while both were trying to head a ball.  This touched off a prolonged argument between the two teams in which Zlatan and Paolo also got involved, among many others.</p>
<p>Research help was provided by LJ user tall_tree.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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